by Hot Ice(lit)
By the time Black Jack McGinty hits the Casa di Cha-Cha, he is wondering whether he has got the stamina for this job. The tobacco haze is rich enough to roll on a virgin's thigh. The Cubans who hang out here are smugglers, who don't pretend to be anything else. Real tough lookin' dudes squintin' over their cheroot stubs. Most of 'em wear berets and striped sailor tops. I can see 'em eyein' Black Jack McGinty's apparel, but none of them are drunk enough or dumb enough to think of casting aspersions on my tailor. Besides, although this is a real low dive, just like the other two joints I've been to over the past two nights, they all got one thing in common. They all talk the same kinda language. And they just love it when I talk dirty.
* * * * *
Back in my office, whiskey bottle on desk, smoke rising from ashtray, the sun rising over the city out through the window. I was looking through the reports from Becky and Vinnie. Three days of surveillance has ended up with two of her operatives floating in the Gulfstream. Two more victims for Monro's wolf-headed god. Damn!
The phone rang before I could lash out and smash it.
'Wolf here.'
A familiar voice: 'Tom? John Legrasse. I'm getting some pretty strange rumours of a new gangland figure in town.'
'Unh-hunh?'
'Wears an eye-patch, a black moustache and always wears gloves. Always the gloves.'
I blew on my gloved knuckles. 'In this heat, John, how does he do it?'
'Have you heard of this guy? He's about your height and build, but he talks with an Irish accent.'
I held the eye patch up to my eye. 'Sounds like he'd stick out in a crowd, but can't say I've ever seen him about. He doesn't sound like we'd run in the same social strata.'
Johnny didn't believe me, but he tried. 'Just thought I'd ask. How's the gumshoe business?'
'Hot. Look, I, eh, gotta go, gotta client here, with me right now.'
I put the phone down.
It rang again.
I picked it up. 'Wolf here.'
'Wolf, it's Pyper. I just got word that the SS Vidor has put in sailing papers with the harbour master's office.'
I sat up straight. 'You got a destination?'
'It's not in US continental waters, which means he doesn't have to register it.'
'We have to talk.'
'My thoughts exactly, my boy.'
I met up with Mose in the park. Boys were flying kites; girls were pushing their prams, training to be Moms; Granddads sailed model boats on the lake.
Pyper came quickly to the point. 'I've made contact with a useful guy. He's an ex-Navy frogman, a demolitions expert. He's prepared to wire charges to the hull of the Vidor - for a price.'
'Can we pay his price?'
'We've still got half of the diamonds that you purloined from Monro's operation.'
I grinned under my hat's brim. It pleased me to finance my anti-Monro activities by using Monro's own finances. Then I thought of what I had to do and the grin went away. 'I'm gonna have to bring my plans forward, can you handle this end of it?'
'Of course, my boy. The secret of a great leader is the art of delegating.'
'Okay, here's what we'll do -'
Mose asked a few sensible questions and then nodded agreement. I watched him go. Behind him, the model boats bobbed on unseasonable waves. One yacht was lying on its side, its sail flat out on the water. I thought that was a bad omen. I called out after Mose, but he was too far away. Besides, how bad could it get?
Two days later my phone rang. It was seven in the evening, with the sun going down, and I'd fallen asleep in my office.
'Wolf here.'
'Wolf - guess who.'
I paused in mid-yawn.
'Monro!'
'Smart boy. I got your Yiddisher papa on the Vidor, Wolf. You want to see him ever again, you meet my boys down at the docks. Don't worry - they'll know you!'
'Monro, if you -' but I was talking to a dead line.
Without thinking I lunged to my feet and tore the phone from the wall, throwing it out through the window. Leaning on my desk, I tried to steady my breathing, to beat down the anger inside, to chase the wolf back into its cell.
'Damn!'
I looked out through my broken window.
'Screw that! I needed to make three more phone calls!'
I reached for my hat and checked that it was angled correctly in the mirror. 'Mose - tell me I'm doing the right thing -'
In the lobby of my office building I used the pay phone. Just three measly phone calls to set the wheels in motion.
A Creole voice answered the first ring. 'This is Black Jack McGinty here, me boys. I gotta bring me plans forward a little. We hit Monro's operation tonight! Don't let me down now.' My other two calls to the Sesame Club and the Casa di Cha-Cha were all but identical. Then Black Jack McGinty died and went to disguise heaven. It was just Tom Wolf, just me and Monro. My previous plans had called for another ship, manned by Captain Hector and his burly Scottish engineer, but I had no time for that now. I was going to have to wing it from here on in. Outside the lobby I hailed a cruising taxi.
'The docks, bud, and there's a ten spot in it if you get me there pronto!'
In the back of the cab, I looked up at the sky out of the cab window. 'Hmmm, it's later than I thought, the moon's rising, Monro -'
By the time the taxi arrived at the docks, the full moon was low over the water.
As I paid off the cabby, I said, 'Remind me to book you if I ever need a get-away driver.' I turned to stare at the moon. I knew it was rising for vengeance tonight. 'It's rising for you, Monro!'
I pulled up my collar and tugged down my hat brim. 'Look out, Monro, tonight Tom Wolf is coming to call and collect some dues owed.'
I pulled my trench coat closed and drew my hat over my face as I walked down the dock side. Hope you got your medicine bag with you, Monro. You're gonna need a pretty good doctor by the time I'm through with you.
As I walked I glanced at my watch. I'd called my hired-help over twenty minutes ago. Right about now, mobsters would be firing tommy-guns from the running boards of Stutz Bear Cats. If I'm any judge of character, I'd say the Jitterbug Club shooting event should just be starting to hot up. They'll be rarin' to go against Monro's operation.
I came to the gangplank. I paused and set my gloved hand on the rope rail. Gotta bad feelin' of deja-vu. I've been here before and I'm still hurtin'.
I knew Becky Quaid had operatives keeping an eye on the Vidor. She'd have a team of two - two, because I'm paying for two. They'd have binoculars on stands. They'd also probably have half-bottles of bathtub gin in their hands and opened sandwiches in wrappers.
I can imagine one of the guys nudging the other as he stares through the binoculars. 'Holeee - Get a load of this guy!'
I could feel my face change. It wasn't the moon that affected my change to werewolf. It was fear. The bones burned in my face and pulled my muscles taut. My teeth pushed out of their sockets into uncanny shining slivers of ivory.
I could imagine the second operative, elbowing his partner aside and staring dumbfounded through the binoculars. 'That's impossible! It's got to be some sort of joke.'
The first operative licks a pencil to enter into the log, operative number two pours his bottle of hooch down the sink while he looks at his watch.
Operative number one says: 'Lessee, what can I put in the record -'
Operative number two says: '20.15, guy in fright-mask boards.'
Operative number one replies: 'Yeah, that's good, "guy in f-r-i-t-e mask bordes -'
I shut out the inconsequential thoughts. I looked up at the Vidor's funnel and saw that it had quite a head of steam up. The engines thrummed through the deck. Monro was all ready and set to head out to sea.
The decks were deserted, but I could hear the noise of retreating feet. Monro's soldiers had taken one look at me, and decided they had business elsewhere. The Vidor lurched as the hawsers went taut, the tugs pulling her out of the harbour. I glanced at my watch. Twenty past eigh
t. Right 'bout now, Monro's speakeasies should be getting a new decor from Jimmy Pantalucci's gunsels out of the Sesame Club. Those clowns never did know how to just knock.
As we left the harbour, a seaman with a carbine showed up. He saw my face and gulped for a moment. He couldn't speak; instead he gestured with his gun butt and I headed below decks.
He showed me into Monro's stateroom, where Monro was sitting on an over-stuffed club chair, a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket beside him. Behind Monro were several gangsters with tommy-guns. I knew all their faces, and their reps. They were ex-cons, each with a rap sheet a yard long.
Monro grinned as I entered. 'Wolf! Come in, come in. Make yourself at home. I'm glad you decided to come as you are! Haww!!' He thumped the arm of his chair and expected his gunsels to join in on the humour; nobody else in the room saw the funny side.
'I'm here for one thing and one thing only, Monro - where's Moses Pyper?'
Monro sat back comfortably in his chair and inhaled on a cigarette in a long holder, his face sly and wreathed with smoke. 'Whoa, slow down, gumshoe. I know time is money to a self-employed jerk like yourself, but don't try to hustle me.'
I took the time to glance about the room. The portholes were too small to use as escape hatches. There were three carbines behind me, and ten tommy-guns behind Monro.
Monro saw me taking stock. 'And don't go getting any bright ideas. Just because you're a lycanthrope, don't think you can start takin' liberties. My boys, here, are all fans of the Lone Ranger, and you know what? They've been pesterin' me to get 'em some fancy silver bullets.'
He snapped his fingers and a Chinese servant stepped out of the shadow of an oriental screen and poured champagne into two glasses.
Monro accepted one from the silver tray. 'Now, you know me, I'm all heart. I said, "Well, if it'll keep you boys off my backs, why sure, but don't all come back askin' for no white horses."'
The Chinese servant stepped forward with downcast eyes and offered me the second glass of champagne.
'What are we drinking to, Monro? Absent friends?'
'Hell, no. Old claim-jumpers like us don't need a reason to drink the best hooch outta France.'
I took small satisfaction in picking up the glass with my clawed hand. The servant had obviously been briefed to not look at my face. His narrow eyes widened in startlement, and the tray trembled for a second as he saw the inhuman nature of my curse.
I swirled the champagne in the glass for a second, not sure if I could physically drink from a champagne flute, with my muzzle sticking out a foot in front of my face. 'So, what's it to be? Do you chop me up and feed me to Malsum?'
Monro drained his glass and jerked his head for his Chinese flunky to refill it. 'You ain't fit for anything other than fish-food, Wolf. Don't start thinkin' you're anything important.'
Monro rose from his seat, one hand in his velvet smoking jacket, cigarette-holder in the other. 'I just wanted to throw you a little party -'
'Party?'
The ranks of the mobsters parted behind Monro and a workman in cement-stained dungarees wheeled in a wheel-barrow with two concrete blocks in it.
Monro grinned as he watched my reaction. 'A little going away party.'
I crushed the champagne flute in my fist. 'You're too late, Monro. You shoulda killed me last week when you had the chance. You shoulda killed me the first chance you got.'
Monro took a drag on his fancy cigarette as he tried to fathom out what was coming next. 'Oh? Why's that?'
'Y'see, even as we speak, the hotheads from the Casa di Cha-Cha are probably blowing your rum-running operation all the way back to Havana.'
Anger glowed like coals in the pits of Monro's eyes. But only for a second, then a steel veil went down and they were blank and grey and dead. I knew then that Monro was just a shell in front of my eyes. Malsum was running the whole show. New Orleans had its very own dark god - and things would never be the same.
Monro was saying, 'It doesn't matter. I'll rebuild and you'll be fish food. Take him up on deck, boys.'
* * * * *
Up on deck we were some way off the coast by now. The lights of New Orleans twinkled in the distance. Mose was already there. He was chained and ready to sleep with the fishes. The rail was open with the concrete blocks at the side, just ready to slip over and down. Down, down and down.
Monro tapped some ash into the concrete mix in the wheel-barrow. 'Y'know, Wolf, I wanted to get you to mix your own concrete but that would take too long and I got a schedule to keep. Life's just full of compromises, ain't it?'
'You're just full of shit, Monro.'
Crew-men started to push the concrete blocks to the edge of the deck.
I growled, 'You don't really expect me to die this way, do you, Monro? Drowning's too easy for me.'
Monro was looking out to sea, enjoying the view of the stars overhead. The moon cast a huge swathe of light on the waters. Very romantic.
I rattled my chains. 'Look at me, Monro. Malsum won't let me die. He's cursed me and if you deprive him of his revenge, then you're going against his wishes.'
Monro guffawed. 'Get real, wolf-jerk. You don't really expect me to believe that. Still I guess you gotta try to talk your way out of this.'
With a bored, idle gestured he signalled for the crew to push them overboard. 'Get them out of my sight.'
I glanced over the side of the Vidor. 'It's a long way down, Mose -'
Mose's teeth were chattering. He strained against the weight of the block as it was pushed inexorably to the edge. 'Watch out for the first step, my boy, it's a -'
The blocks went over at the same time. Instead of letting myself be wrenched over, I jumped, reaching out for Pyper at the same time.
As we went down, Pyper screamed in my ear: 'Luuuuuu-luuuuuuuuuuu!'
Then we hit the dark waters. We both went deep. I had done this only a week ago, and I knew how deep the fall would take me. This time, however, I knew the blocks would make the fall last forever. I lost my hat, like I knew I would. Just can't keep 'em nowadays.
As we sank deeper and deeper, I asked myself the question: Who needs a silver bullet to kill a werewolf?
The depth was forcing the air out of my mouth. My eyes were bulging, ears popping. I could taste blood in the water.
Who needs silver bullets, when all it takes is the entire Gulf of Mexico?
The waters around us were totally black, but inside as well, I could feel the darkness encroaching. It wasn't the lack of oxygen, or the cold - it was the pressure.
An inconsequential thought flashed through my mind: 'I wonder if I bite a fish, will it turn into a were-fish? I'll probably never know.'
My hands in chains were straining at the bonds. I could feel an animal fear squirming in my guts. It was on a deeper level than my merely human fear. It was an elemental thing. Like lava in the soul, under pressure to burst. My chains broke.
Well, what about it? I'm harder to kill than I thought.
But I knew it had very little to do with me. It was the wolf wanted to be free.
The block fell away and I could feel our descent lessen. Mose's block was still attached, but I made sure the wolf didn't just abandon him. Mose was part of my pack and a wolf isn't a solitary creature.
I gripped the chains that held us to the block, and the animal surge in me tore the chains loose from Pyper's concrete block.
I had no breath to speak, but I thought frantically: 'Hang on, Mose, this is no way for an old Yid like you to cash in your chips!'
I kicked upwards, dragging Pyper with me.
Surprisingly soon, buoyed up by our lungs, we reached the surface. And what did I find floating there? - My hat. I took the time to grab it and stuff it into my pocket. I knew I'd need it later.
We coughed and gasped on the surface for a while, riding the slow swell, getting our breath back.
'Sweet mother! That air tastes good!'
Treading water, I held Pyper's head up above the water. The Vidor was s
ome distance away, turning in a huge sweep, obviously heading back to harbour.
'How d'you feel, Mose?'
'Tired, Wolf. How can we get back? We'll never swim back to land from here.'
'I don't think we'll need to - the Vidor's turning about and heading back to port.'
We swam in an intercept course and caught up with the boat being towed behind the Vidor. I caught the dragging painter and made sure that Mose was secure. I climbed aboard, then hauled him in.
'This is the fishing smack that my friend, the frogman, and I were in when they captured us.'
I growled, fighting down a surge of triumph. 'If he wasn't such a cheap bastard, Monro would've scuppered this boat.'
Pyper huddled in the cockpit, his teeth chattering. 'Wolf, this is the first chance we've had to talk -'
'You think we got time to talk?'
'Listen to me - this is important! I got the charges set, they're due to go off in half an hour.'
I looked up at the Vidor's stern from my vantage point in the small boat. 'That's not good enough, Mose. This is between me and Monro - I'm gonna tear his heart out with my hands!'
'Wolf, my boy, that's no way to talk - not even of your worst enemy!'
'Mose, Mose,' I groaned, 'y'don't understand. I gotta do this. If I don't then Monro'll die, sure, but Malsum's spirit or ghost is just gonna seek out another human victim and we'll be back to square one, except that this time we won't know the face that Malsum is hiding behind.'
Pyper looked shocked as the full import of my words sank home. 'I never thought of that!'
'You hang on in here, Mose, until the charges go off. Either I'll be back or I won't.'
Swinging up onto the heavy line, I began to sloth-climb my way aboard the Vidor. Halfway across, I could hear nothing but the screws beneath me, and the sea all frothing.
Strengthened by the threat of the screws in the water, I forced myself on and climbed on board the stern of the Vidor.